MORGAN STANLEY DW INC., and JEFFREY JON, Appellants, v. JANET C. HALLIDAY, ELIZABETH ANN HALLIDAY, SUSAN JANE HALLIDAY, SARAH HALLIDAY VERRIER, Appellees., 873 So. 2d 400

Summary

The trust was managed solely by the trustees; the beneficiary had no power over the trust assets and could not invade the principal. Some or all of the trust assets were placed by the trustees in an account with the financial company. The customer account agreement was executed by the trustees and the company but not by the beneficiary, who was not named as a party. The company argued that the arbitration clause in the account agreement required that the action be arbitrated. The appellate court held that given the principle that a party could be forced to arbitrate only those matters it had specifically agreed to arbitrate, courts should avoid engaging in interpretation of the agreements of other parties in order to require non-parties to arbitrate. The trustees were fiduciaries of the beneficiary, not established agents. Consequently, the law of agency did not bind the beneficiary to the account agreement. The court found that the account was more than likely primarily for the ...